


Rocking Chairs and Town Cars

by gertiemcfuzz



Series: Subpoenas and Spousal Privilege [4]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-28
Updated: 2016-03-28
Packaged: 2018-05-29 14:23:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6379744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gertiemcfuzz/pseuds/gertiemcfuzz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A missing piece from Subpoenas and Spousal Privilege.</p><p>After Kara went MIA for three days on important Supergirl business, Cat had words for her. Who knew the lack of any from Carter would be worse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rocking Chairs and Town Cars

**Author's Note:**

> Hey Guys! Long time no...read? write? Anyways, here is the next installment of Subpoenas. It will be one of my (hopefully many) contributions to the 2016 Femslash Big Bang. I hope you all like it, there's a ton of Carter/Kara interactions. 
> 
> And for those of you who are waiting for an update on Autopilot, fret not, I have a week long break from work coming in four days that I plan to take advantage of! In the meantime, I hope you have all been enjoying Supercat March Madness and are all preparing yourselves for the pain that will be raining down with Angst week. Seriously, how did we all get so lucky to have such an organized and lovely fandom? High-fives to Joy, Kathleen, Lola, and Charlie, you guys are real life superheros, and of course @a-e-radley.

**Ten Months and One Week:**

“He’s asleep.” Kara spoke softly as she entered their bedroom, as though the object of their discussion would hear them and make a liar out of her.

Cat looked up briefly from her book and gave her a soft smile, the kind that flashed across her face so quickly that Kara was always left thinking she’d imagined it, before patting the bed beside her. Kara wasted no time striding across the room and flopping gracelessly onto her side of the bed.

She was exhausted, the past five days had been rough and things between her and Cat were still a little awkward and stunted, but she wouldn’t complain; she’d caused this mess and she was going to try her best to make it right. She was just glad that she’d had the forethought to go about her nightly routine before going to read with the young Grant. She’d learned her lesson after spending the first night since she’d come home in a sundress, sleeping in the gliding rocker in his room that stopped being comfortable two hours in. Not even an alien hostile would pull her from this bed now.

Her three-day absence had affected Carter more than either she or Cat had been expecting. She’d known that she had messed-up, the blow-out with Cat had made that more than clear, but she hadn’t been expecting the fall-out with him to be worse.

_Kara was clearing their dishes away, listening to Cat begrudgingly admit that the saffron had been worth the small fortune she’d spent on it when she heard the door open._

_Carter had been with Lucy, Cat not wanting him home to witness the fight that had been boiling in her for the past three days, she’d sent Lucy an all-clear text after they’d sat down to eat to let her know it was okay to bring him back home._

_She’d heard his feet shuffle past the kitchen entrance, he hadn’t even bothered to look up as he moved toward his nook in the living room. His movement stopped as soon as her heard Lucy greet her._

_“Hey K, good to see you made it back safely.”_

_She’d barely managed to return the greeting before the wind was knocked out of her. His arms were locked in a vice grip around her waist, and his curls sat just right for her to press her nose to his head and breath in that sweet scent that, despite his thirteen years, told her he was still a little boy._

_“You’re home.” He mumbled into her shoulder, his eyes squeezed shut. “I missed you.”_

_She pulled him closer, one hand resting on the back of his head and the other running gently up and down his back, something she’d learned had a calming effect on both Grants. “I missed you more.” She whispered back. She wasn’t sure how she’d managed to survive three days without this._

_And then that ache in her bones was back, the one that crept up on her when she looked across the room and found him so immersed in a book that the little crinkles in his forehead came out just like his mother’s, or when she would sneak into Cat’s study when she was home alone and pull out the family albums, trying to imagine what it would have been like to have been there to witness, first hand, as he spread yellow frosting across his face on his first birthday._

_She’s missed so much of his life, and even though she knew that this thing with Cat would eventually have to end, she’d made a promise to herself that she wouldn’t miss out on him ever again. Life after their split was very high on the list of Things Not To Be Talked About™, sitting somewhere between the soft lilt in Cat’s voice whenever she introduced Kara as her wife or the way Kara had begun to pull Cat close to her when they slept, even on nights she didn’t have nightmares. Even so, where Carter was concerned, there seemed to be an unspoken agreement that Kara would always have a place in his life._

_As they continued to stand there in the kitchen, she could feel two sets of eyes on them, but she kept her focus solely on him, content to hold him close for as long as he needed. Finally, after hearing the door click shut behind Lucy, he’d pulled back._

_“I haven’t read without you.” He declared, turning and walking toward his room in what was clearly a cue to her to follow._

_“You coming?” She briefly paused her steps to check with Cat._

_“Not tonight, you two should have some time together.” She insisted._

_By the time she made it to Carter’s room, he was changed into his pajamas and climbing into bed. She tried a few times to talk to him but he was resolute in his silence, never giving her more than a shake or nod of his head. Finally, she cracked open their book and read instead, until she could see his eyes drooping._

_She’d closed it and got up, pulling his blankets up to his chin and brushing a kiss to his curls, just like any other night, except she could hear his heart rate go up, his eyes shooting back open to search for her._

_“You mind if I hang here for a little bit?” She asked after a moment, inclining her head toward the glider in the corner, knowing he wouldn’t ask her to stay. It was one of the things she’d found they had in common, both of them had a hard time asking for the things they needed._

_He nodded. And that’s how Cat found them the next morning, Carter still fast asleep, turned so he could see Kara if he woke up, and Kara bent awkwardly to fit into the chair. She’d sent Cat a text after trying to sneak out the first time, Carter’s head shooting up immediately when he’d heard the creak of the chair._

The rest of the weekend went the same way, save for Kara sleeping in his room, Cat insisted they return to their normal routine, saying it’d only encourage him to worry if she made that particular concession more than once.

Nonetheless, Kara could still hear his heart rate go up every time she left the room, and he was still only acknowledging her with short one or two word responses. She could tell he wasn’t trying to be cruel, no matter how much it hurt her, he was just trying to find his footing.

She would catch him watching her, his gaze calculating, searching for an answer to a question he hadn’t been brave enough to pose out loud yet.

She wondered how much he knew, Cat had only told him that she’d had an emergency that she needed to attend to and that she’d be back as soon as she could. They’d decided to keep the Supergirl thing from him, not wanting to put him into a position where anyone could take advantage of him, but he was obviously a very clever boy, so much so that Kara wouldn’t be surprised if he knew more than he let on.

It wasn’t until she dropped him off at school Monday morning that he finally broke the silence that’d been sitting heavy between them all weekend.

_“Okay, so, your mom has a meeting this afternoon that might run a little late so I’m going to pick you up after school and we’ll go hang at the office until she’s done, and then we’ll grab dinner on our way home.” She told him as she reached down to pick up his backpack from the floor of the town car._

_“What if there’s another emergency?” He asked suddenly, and Kara was so surprised to finally hear his voice that she nearly missed the uncertainty within it._

_When Kara didn’t respond immediately, he continued. “You were supposed to pick me up last week Wednesday, but there was an emergency.”_

_“Carter, I-” she started, but he cut her off._

_“I didn’t know where you were, and Mom was really freaked out even if she wouldn’t say so, and she said you’d call but you didn’t, and I thought maybe you forgot about us.” There were hot tears making their way down his face, and he swiped harshly at them, out of embarrassment._

_And Rao, she’d known she’d messed up, because she was still finding broken pieces of Cat’s favorite vase in their carpet, and it was taking an hour longer than normal to get him to go to bed at night, but she stupidly thought that it was just because he was starting to figure out the Supergirl thing. Which he probably was, but now she could tell it was more than that. Because in thirteen years, Cat was the only adult who’d ever stayed for him. Katherine was hardly able to remember his name, and his dad was beyond inconsistent in his own visits, either forgetting them or showing up and cutting them short because he got bored._

_She was supposed to be better than that, because she knew what it was like when the adults in your life let you down, and she never wanted to be that to him._

_She put his bag back on the ground where it had been, and turned so that they were facing each other, glad that Carter always insisted on arriving to school at least thirty minutes before everybody else._

_“I’m really sorry Carter.” She said, pausing for a brief second to collect her thoughts before continuing. “I want you to know that I could never forget about you or your mom. You guys are my family, just as much as Alex and Eliza are. I should have called and let you know that I was okay. I promise that I was thinking about you the whole time; I was working like crazy to get home as soon as I could. I guess, I was just thinking about how much I missed you, and I didn’t stop to think that maybe you guys missed me too.”_

_“I guess that must be kind of weird,” he admitted, “before, you just had Alex, and now you have us too.”_

_“It is kind of weird, but it’s also pretty amazing. And just because it was an adjustment, doesn’t mean what I did was right. I really am sorry. I can’t promise that there won’t be any more emergencies that need my attention, but I do promise that I won’t leave you guys hanging like that again, okay?”_

_“Okay.” He agreed after a minute._

_“Are you ready to go to school now?” She asked, gesturing to his backpack._

_His brow wrinkled uncertainly and she could hear his heart start to beat a little faster. Before he had the chance to answer she interrupted._

_“How about this,” she suggested, “just for today, I’ll stay right here.” She rolled the window on her side of the car down. “That way, if you start to feel anxious, you can look out your window,” She pointed to the window on the side of the building that she knew belonged to his classroom, “and you’ll be able to see that I’m right here.”_

_“What about Mom?” He asked._

_“I think she can survive one more day without me, plus, I have my tablet and your mom insists that all her cars have wifi, it’ll be like a mobile office.”_

_“Are you sure?” And there was that thing again where he couldn’t ask for what he needed._

_But that was alright because Kara knew how to give it to him anyway. “I’m not going anywhere, I promise.”_

_“Okay.” He agreed._

_“Okay.”_

_With one last swipe at his face and a quick sniffle, he was out of the car and heading toward the building, looking back three or four times before making it to the doors._

_Kara pulled out her phone and called Alex who told her not to worry about anything, they’d manage a day without Supergirl; Cat grumbled a little more, and Kara was already making a note to call Lucy and ask her to bring an extra latte and some M &Ms with her to work, but Kara could also hear the pride in her voice because at the end of the day Carter always came first._

_The day actually went by fairly quickly, with Kara trying to get as much done as she could from the backseat of the town car (and damn did she miss that gliding rocker by hour three), she caught Carter looking out the window for her no less than a dozen times, but by the time he was pulling the door open at the end of the day, he was chattering all about his newest idea for the upcoming science fair like nothing had been wrong earlier that day, and she realized she’d sit on a rock made of kryptonite for the rest of her life if it meant he never stopped talking to her again._

“I was beginning to think I’d be gaining an extra few hours of reading time.” Cat said as she closed her book and set it aside, pulling her glasses off to set them on top of it.

“Don’t jinx it!” Kara whispered, turning her head to glare at Cat with nothing but seriousness. It was the first time since she’d been back that Carter had gotten to sleep at his normal bedtime.

Cat just rolled her eyes as she moved further down the bed, pulling her pillows with her from where they were resting against the headboard and rearranging them so she could sleep.

“If you sleep on your stomach, you’re going to snore, and I won’t be held accountable for my actions if that happens.” She warned Kara, whose eyes were already slipping shut.

“Kryptonians don’t snore.” Kara muttered but moved so she was laying on her side anyways.

“Thank you.”

“Yeah, well, I’m starting to think that you’re kind of serious about having Alex do that sleep study so…”

“No, I meant for Carter. Thank you for taking such care with him for the last few days.”

Kara’s eyes opened again slowly, “I- of course. It’s, you know, it’s what he needed. I messed up, he deserves to know that he’s worth me fixing my mistakes for.”

Cat shook her head, in something close to awe. “In ten months, you’ve given him something his father hasn’t managed in thirteen years.”

“I love him.” Kara said as though it were the answer to all of life’s biggest questions.

Cat shook her head again and rolled so they were pressed together, “He loves you too.” Her words were whispered against Kara’s clavicle and there was something in them that made Kara feel like there was more, but after nearly a week of feeling like this whole new life was slipping through her fingers, she wasn’t about to push and ask. A part of herself wanted to laugh, because she and Carter really are alike in this.

The words were on the tip of her tongue, _“What about you?”_ , but she couldn’t bring herself to break the peace and say them aloud. Instead she just pulled Cat closer and let herself pretend the answer Cat would give her was the one she wanted to hear.

As she finally slipped into unconsciousness, she could have sworn her brain tricked her into hearing Cat’s voice whisper the words aloud.

“I love you too.”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you guys liked it! Thanks for reading!!!


End file.
